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Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

jonathanhaidt.substack.com

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Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#151

Post by jvolkman »

jsonne wrote: post #109
jvolkman wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does that include Hacker News?

HN falls under work for me (in the sense that I learn things, I have a company that employs engineers so there's a networking element etc) but point taken. I guess I don't think about it as much because it's significantly less problematic than say Instagram and at least I learn things here. Notably I did cut out reddit which imho is the most toxic social network I was a part of.

Got it. Wasn't trying to call you out; just curious. I've read the "removing social media has made me much happier" claim so many times but haven't been able to do it yet. But I think I'm close.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#152

Post by JohnFen »

shagie wrote: post #43
warner25 wrote: post #2

I'm still reading it, but this is great so far. As a father to four little girls, though, it makes me feel really defeated. I can already see that social media has eroded my wife's mental health. I just don't know what to do in the next few years when our girls approach the age when everyone else will get an iPhone and have an Instagram account. I want to say no, but that leads to many other issues, including what th…

While the generations are a bit dated - https://waitbutwhy.com/2013/09/why-generation-y-yuppies-are-... > Social media creates a world for Lucy where A) what everyone else is doing is very out in the open, B) most people present an inflated version of their own existence, and C) the people who chime in the most about their careers are usually those whose careers (or relationships) are going the best, while struggling…

> the people who chime in the most about their careers are usually those whose careers (or relationships) are going the best

I'm skeptical about this. I suspect that it's more likely that such people are presenting an image of their lives that is much better than the reality.

In my experience, people who are living great lives rarely feel the need to tell everyone how great their lives are. Even when they're teenagers.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#153

Post by lozenge »

theshrike79 wrote: post #119
prepend wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a parent to a 12 year old girl, I’ve been fighting the “no social media” fight since she requested at 9. Every single one of her friends have social media and I think it is negative to be isolated in that way. But I also notice that she seems to have positive benefits over her friends, but of course it’s tough to measure. It’s strange to me because I’ve talked about this literature and whatnot with other parents a…

This is really baffling to me, because social media sites have an age limit of 13 in most western countries. ...and this is by the companies themselves, if they are found out to be "marketing to children", they get hit with a whole another set of legal issues. Epic just got hit with this because of Fortnite and has to pay over $200M fines. The only issue is that there is zero oversight on the age limit, there is no w…

You definitely can report an underage user.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#154

Post by sverona »

Here's a question I don't know the answer to. How does an already depressed and dysphoric trans person --- who doesn't know they're trans --- with unsupportive parents ever, ever find out what the cause of their depression is without a robust network of connection to people from elsewhere?

Let's assume they live in a deeply rural area in which variant sexualities and genders are frowned upon. They are the only person who feels this way that they've ever met. Their parents restrict the media they watch for whatever reason and they assume they're broken.

This is not a hypothetical. Coming out saved my life. I don't use social media because I have better ways to spend my time, but I'm wary of taking away the one light in a tunnel that this only-nominally-hypothetical person might have.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#155

Post by [deleted] »

api wrote: post #58
anoonmoose wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorists existed long before social media did.

That's not the point. Social media algorithms amplify every form of madness and toxicity, because it draws people in and gets their attention. Crazy sorts of conspiracy theories, radical ideologies, cults, memetic mental illness, you name it... the more toxic it is the more it drives engagement. This phenomenon isn't fundamentally new. Media has understood "if it bleeds it leads" for hundreds of years. What I think i…

[deleted]

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#156

Post by danbolt »

colinrand wrote: post #104

YMMV, but the thing that seems to work in my house (mid teen girl) is to actively be engaged with her social life and have the meta (not Meta) conversation about social media impact with her regularly. She will have to learn to deal with her reality and live with it on her own, but helping her have a set of tools to describe and analyze it is beneficial. Tools like being aware of how much time she spends on it, how o…

I think this hits the nail on the head. Or, it sounds like you’re engaged to help give your child the self-advocacy they need to be responsible for their own life.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#157

Post by snovymgodym »

AussieWog93 wrote: post #85

Don't forget that HN is also a form of social media. It will make you angry and emotionally exhausted. :)

It's true, but the lack of curated feeds, semi-anonymous profiles, and the relatively strict moderation of topics and discussion style certainly make it seem less addicting and harmful than the others.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#158

Post by z3t4 »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #9

I wonder if online dating tends to lead to similar impacts to mental health for some groups of people as social media does to teen girls. Just like in Haidt's examples, it's impersonal, phone-based, leading to constant social comparison, feelings of rejection, ostracism and ghosting. I wouldn't be shocked if a few years from now research came out showing that it has similar effects to adults, but they're just better…

No wonder if you feel mentally better if you are not in need of those apps - eg. you already have a decent social life.

Re: Social media is a cause, not a correlate, of mental illness in teen girls

#160

Post by culebron21 »

mrpopo wrote: post #87

I don't necessarily disagree with the conclusion, but the dismissal of other factors is insufficient: > Why did a measure of loneliness at school go up around the world only after 2012, as the global economy got better and better? The economy didn't get better for everyone, in fact inequality rose starkly; this might be a correlating factor. > It’s not because of the 9/11 attacks, wars in the middle east, or school s…

You're arguing with the discussion section in the bottom. But in the middle, there's analysis on researches that made a clear experiment. Researchers asked students to restrict the usage for several weeks, and they showed some effect, while the papers where restriction lasted only one week, showed no change. This is rather clear evidence of causation.
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